


A Letter to Tunisia

by dashakay



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-07
Updated: 2016-03-07
Packaged: 2018-05-25 08:34:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6187618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dashakay/pseuds/dashakay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A barefoot summer night, gin and tonics, and memories of love, thousands of miles away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Letter to Tunisia

**Author's Note:**

> Well, what do you know? I found a fic I completely forgot I wrote! Weird. I don’t think this was ever widely distributed though. It was a Christmas gift for Plausible Deniability, written in 1999 or 2000.

June 2, 1968 

Darling, 

Today is one of those simply glorious summer evenings and I’m thinking of you slaving away in the barren reaches of farthest Tunisia, mopping the sweat from your poor, beleaguered brow. 

The shadows are lengthening in the back yard and I’m barefoot and sitting at the patio table, sipping my first gin and tonic of the night.  I can hear Bill cutting the front yard grass (silly Bill, we could hire a man for that chore but I believe it makes him feel virile and capable to do yard work) and the children are shouting as they chase each other in a never-ending game of tag. 

The kids have been having a grand time now that they can spend the entire day outdoors.  It means that I have to spend a good amount of time rinsing off their filthy feet before I’ll allow them in the house, but it’s worth it to see the high color in their cheeks and watch them getting tanner by the day.  Soon we’ll go up to Rhode Island and it’ll be warm enough to take them to the beach nearly every afternoon and I believe that this is the year that Samantha will learn to swim.  She wants to be able to do everything Fox can, and her brother can dart in the Atlantic waves like a small fish. 

Ah, but Fox is his father’s son. He is just like Bill, with a lively, serious mind.  The boy taxes me sometimes with his endless questions—“Mommy, why is the sky blue one day and gray the next?“  "What makes the car go fast and how do you get it to stop?”  And my personal, if a bit embarrassing favorite, “What makes me a boy and Samantha a girl?”  He’s reading at the fourth grade level, despite having just finished first grade, and drags his beloved book, _The Big Book of Stars and Space_ , everywhere.  His other new thing is ghosts.  During the holidays, my mother told him ghost stories every night.  I was furious when I found out, for I feared they would scare him, but instead he’s merely fascinated.  Sometimes he dresses in one of Bill’s old sport coats and stalks around the house with his grandfather’s cane, looking for ghosts.  He swears he saw one in the attic, but I believe it was the product of an over-active imagination. 

And lovely little Samantha… I despise the nickname “Sammie,” as you know. She can be dreamy, just like me.  She loves fairy tales and dressing up in my negligees and pretending to be a fairy princess.  But there’s a scrappy, feisty side to Samantha, and that must come from you, my love. She wants to climb the apple trees in the side yard, to drive the speedboat (sometimes I allow her to sit on my lap and pretend to steer, which makes her scream with laughter), to hit a softball clear across the yard.  And when she can’t do those things, she howls in frustration at her own limitations.  I picture her a few years older, cutting across the bay on water-skis, as graceful and deft as you are.  When our daughter smiles, she looks just like you. I cannot believe that Bill hasn’t seen it, but then again, we often don’t see the things we don’t want to believe, yes? 

Samantha and Fox get on well, despite the four-year gap in their ages.  She tags after him wherever he goes, trying her best to keep up.  He doesn’t seem to mind and treats her with affection.  I’m glad they get on well, for there won’t be many children his age when we go up to the summer place.  But he’s rather a solitary child, anyhow, preferring to read and hunt for frogs rather than play games with other children.  I’m going to put him into Little League next year so he can learn to be a team player. 

But I do natter on about the children, don’t I? 

I can’t believe it’s been nearly a year since I last saw you.  Sometimes after Bill has gone to sleep, I steal downstairs, fix myself a drink and sit on the porch, smoking and thinking about the gorgeous month you and I spent together when Bill was in Texas last summer.  How clever of you to rent a cottage for you, Cassandra and Jeff, just down the road from us!  I’ll never forget the night you came after midnight and we danced on the porch as “Moon River” played through the window on the phonograph.  In your strong arms I felt so safe and loved, as if we could remain like that for a blissful eternity.  And, of course, I remember the afternoons in the boathouse, making love on the old, musty air mattress, soaked with sweat and the intoxicating perfume of our love.  If I close my eyes I’m with you again, being held by you in the dizzy aftermath, sharing a cigarette and laughing. 

Please return soon.  I hate to sound like the damsel in distress, but I miss you so.  Life with Bill is as arid and lifeless as your Tunisian desert.  He’s been drinking more, a quiet, morose drunk who woodenly sits in his easy chair, staring into space and nodding.  I can’t reach him anymore and quite frankly, I don’t want to. Despite nine years of marriage, I don’t know Bill.  And he doesn’t know me, not like you, darling.  To him, I’m his gingham-aproned little wife, cooking his dinners, mending his socks and raising his children (oh, if he only know the sad truth).  You know the real me, the woman of passion and ambition.  I was created in _your_ image, love, not Bill’s. 

More and more, I dream of the life we could have together.  I visualize our stately brick townhouse in Georgetown and greeting you with a martini as you return home from a long day of saving our fair nation.  I see the thrilling parties we could attend at embassies and even the White House and sitting by your side as everyone laughs at our witty repartee.  As you can see, I’m tired of living on this little tourist island.  I want more. The children would love Washington and all its advantages. You would be such a loving father to Samantha and Fox.  I’ve seen your tender affection with Samantha. I even dare to dream of us having another child, one that would be legitimately ours and would proudly carry your name. 

I dream of going to bed with you every night and waking in your arms, smiling at your beautiful face. 

I told you I’m a dreamer. 

Last summer, the night before you had to leave, you asked me: “What would you think if Bill and Cassandra were to have an unfortunate accident?” I told you I couldn’t even consider such a thing, that it was beyond the realm of my comprehension. Now I’m not so sure.  I find myself thinking of more as the silence deepens between Bill and me and my ache for you grows exponentially. Sometimes it seems like the only possible solution to our sad dilemma.  I don’t know. Perhaps when we meet in August I’ll have a clearer answer for you. Perhaps I’ll be ready to break free and begin our glorious new life. 

If such a thing is possible, I kiss you from afar.  And I dream of the day when we can finally be together. 

All my love and devotion, 

T 

P.S.  I am enclosing some snapshots of Samantha, so you can see how gorgeous your little girl has become.


End file.
